Lost and Found
by Uovoc
Summary: It may have been the worst Snogletog gift ever given. But then, Snotlout's distastefulness knew no bounds.


_Hiccup stared at the crude wooden box in his arms. on the lid were charcoal markings that, with a liberal amount of imagination, could possible express the giver's wishes for a "Hape Snogltog."_

_"You gonna open it or what?" demanded Snotlout._

_Truth be told, Hiccup didn't know if he wanted to find out what on Midgard could be inside. He had no idea what Snotlout thought would make a nice present. He resisted the urge to give it a good shake, in case the thing inside was still alive. Watched expectantly by his cousin, he gingerly pried off the lid._

_Confusion, shock, and revulsion crossed Hiccup's face, in that order. he was now the proud owner of several spinelike bones, still held together by bits of blackened, desiccated skin._

_"Wow," he finally managed to get out. "Wow. This...This is really... something. Ha ha." Toothless sniffed the box curiously. "Hey, you recognize this, bud?" It reeked of Snotlout, but the dragon knew what it was, all right. He just no longer associated it with himself._

_Hiccup wasn't showing the proper elation. Snotlout was irritated. "No need to thank me or anything, " he prompted, folding his burly arms. What an ungrateful wretch. And after all the trouble he went through to get that thing, too..._

* * *

The morning after was always the worst. You woke up tired, because you'd spent the night valiantly fending off dragons, and cold, because the roof had had a hole burnt in it, and in a bad mood, because now you had to fix the hole. And rebuild about a hundred other buildings. Dragon battle over, now everyone had to get down to the less thrilling aspects of living in a wooden village.

"'We have to help each other,'" he mimicked the chief, angrily pounding on a shingle. "What a load of touchy-feely crap. What happened to 'We're Vikings, we do it ourselves'?"

Maybe everyone wouldn't need so much helping if Hiccup wasn't knocking over flaming beacons all the time. His cousin never had to face the consequences for his actions. After the bucket of nails fiasco, he'd been expressly banned from a twenty-foot radius around all construction sites. Hiccup never had to help other people. In fact, he gave _reverse_ _help_, like when yet another of his crazy inventions took out Sven right in the middle of last night's battle. Snotlout snorted. It made sense, since he acted the complete opposite of a Viking.

Right not was a great example: Hiccup was trotting stealthily towards the forest when he should be holed up in the forge, fixing their weapons. Lazy bum.

"Oi!" Snotlout yelled from the rooftop. "Found your Night Fury yet?" he jeered.

Hiccup paused without turning around. Then he hunched his shoulders and ran even faster. Snotlout stopped mid-hammerswing. This was too good a chance to pass up. A little Hiccup heckling was just what he needed to brighten his day. He clambered down the ladder, keeping an eye out for his father. Spitelout was nowhere in sight, having left his son to do the dirty work while he went to boast of his previous night's deeds to the other men.

Hiccup had been swallowed up by the forest. Probably heading for Raven Point, he thought, remembering something his cousin had been jabbering. Snotlout grinned. "Look, I'm being helpful," he said to an imaginary Stoick. "I'm helping Hiccup find his dragon." At the moment, Hiccup was nowhere in sight, but that didn't deter him. There was a shortcut around the base of the cliffs. High tide wasn't for another few hours, so the coast was clear. Literally.

Knowing Hiccup, the guy was so damn stubborn that he'd search the whole point before giving up. And Snotlout would be there for him, every step of the way. marching through the underbrush, he happily prepared mental insults to throw. _Oh, hey, I see you haven't found your dragon yet. That's because THERE ISN"T ONE! HA HA HA!_

The smell of smoke stopped him dead in his tracks. Out here in the forest, not a house in sight, fire meant dragons. He gulped, gripping his hammer. While he could definitely take out a dragon anytime, he had to admit that he hadn't actually been through dragon training yet. Those were just formalities, probably. Besides, nothing could replace the Viking blood running though his veins right? (_Yup, so you better make sure it stays there, said a little voice from his limbic center._)

He dared to creep around the trunk of a tree. For an infinitesimal moment, he wondered if the last thing he saw would be a blast of blue flame. Then he came to senses. No way had Hiccup actually downed a Night Fury. Successful Hiccup was an oxymoron. It was one of those things that just didn't happen, like soap.

nevertheless, he was relieved when all that revealed itself were the still-smoldering remains of a pine. Emboldened, he circled the tree cautiously. One of the main branches had been nearly torn off, as if wrenched downward by an immense force. Smeared on the wood was a dark substance that definitely wasn't sap. His eyes followed the spatter to the split in the trunk.

Caught in the crack was a dark-colored scrap of something. It was wedged tightly, but no match for his bulging biceps. Snotlout pulled down a raggedy, blood-encrusted mess of bone and flesh.

"No freaking way," he breathed, examining his find. Enough of the skin remained intact to show the unmistakable texture of scales. Smoother than a Gronkle, nubbier than a Zippleback's hide, it didn't match any dragon he'd ever seen. Which left the one dragon no one had ever seen.

"He did it! He hit a freaking Night Fury!"

Yet, there was no carcass in sight. It was till running around, then. Spinning about, he peered into the undergrowth, searching for a glimpse of-what? No one actually knew what they looked like. Big and scaly, he'd wager. Images of exploding guard towers filled his mind's eye, and the prospect of trudging through the misty forest suddenly became much less appealing. Clutching his trophy, Snotlout ran as fast as he could all the way back to the village. he was sure he heard an engraged roar issue from the trees behind him.

* * *

The usual gang was clustered in the shadow of the storehouse. Snotlout had thought it wise to avoid his own house for a while.

"Check it out," he said in a dramatic whisper. "Genuine piece of Night Fury." He pulled out his prize with a flourish.

"Where'd you get that?" demanded Fishlegs.

"Tore it off when I wrestled it," said Snotlout casually. "With my face." That sounded much more impressive than "I found it in a tree" or, gods forbid, "It's from the one that Hiccup caught." Hiccup hadn't returned from the forest yet, but he wasn't too worried.

Fishlegs was surprised. "Like, on the ground?"

"Duh. Do I look like I can fly7"

"But they say that Night Furies never touch land," said Fishlegs, unconvinced.

"Shows what you know. This one did."

Astrid was similarly unconvinced. She'd endured years of Snotlout's cupposed heroics. "If no one's ever seen a Night Fury, how do your know what it was?"

"Well, what else could it be? This look like a Gronkle to you?"

"It's so beat up, it could be anything. Even your dad's boot."

Snotlout appealed to the twins. They usually bought whatever he was selling.

"It's kind of...mangled," said Tuffnut.

"Yeah, like our cat after the bed fell on it," snickered Ruffnut. "Wait, that's not our cat, is it? 'Causse we buried him on a boat."

"I don't believe it," decided Astrid.

"What? We did. I can dig him back out to prove it."

Snotlout was devastated. Even worse, that afternoon he saw Hiccup tottering up the hill to the chief's house, clearly unharmed.

* * *

In the days that followed, Hiccup didn't make another peep about a Night Fury, dead or alive. There was a noticeable lack of uproar about a downed dragon in the hills. The find from the forest went into a box underneath Snotlout's bed. Every night when he flopped onto the covers, sore from dragon training, he'd reach down and pull it out. "I know you're out there," he'd mutter to the darkness. "I'll be back." The distinction of being the first Viking to kill a Night Fury would be his alone.

* * *

_Inspired by the an image from AvannaK's Tumblr. It's weird to think of that missing tail fin, lying somewhere lonely in the forest._

_Whaddya think? Tell me in a review._


End file.
